Gender job quotas: State contractors forced to hire 40 per cent women

UPDATE: Tony Abbott has rubbished a draconian new Australian Human Rights Commission push to set new gender workforce quotas, labelling it “anti-men”.

The controversial gender quotas would be a blow to businesses in male-dominated industries such as construction, electricity and water supply, and manufacturing, where blokes make up at least 80 per cent of the workforce. Picture: Jenny Evans

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TONY Abbott has rubbished a draconian new Australian Human Rights Commission push to set new gender workforce quotas, labelling it “anti-men”.

Under new sex quotas set by the Australian Human Rights Commission, government contractors would be forced to employ a workforce consisting of at least 40 per cent women.

Sex Discrimination Commissioner Kate Jenkins has told the federal government to take “disruptive action’’ and make private sector contractors hire more women, to help close the 16 per cent pay gap between male and female workers.

“Pull your head in,” the former prime minister said of Ms Jenkins, during an interview with Sydney radio 2GB.

“We absolutely have to give women a fair go but some of this stuff sounds like it’s just anti-men.”

‘Anti-men’.... Tony Abbott has attacked gender job quotas.

Manpower.

Under the plan, companies that fail or refuse to recruit similar numbers of men and women risk losing lucrative government contracts in the gender-bending experiment intended to boost women’s pay but which business groups have warned could mean a bad outcome for taxpayers and tougher conditions for small businesses.

Ms Jenkins wants government agencies to include a clause in contracts requiring “demonstrated efforts to improve gender balance’’ — with targets of 40 per cent women.

Contractors would have to prove that they have “gender-balanced shortlists’’ for job ­interviews.

“This means that the gender balance in the organisation would be 40 per cent men and 40 per cent women, with the remaining 20 per cent unallocated to allow for flexibility,’’ Ms Jenkins said.

“I would want to see evidence that organisations had made extra efforts to reach these targets in recruitment, for example through gender-balanced shortlists.

“In male-dominated industries I would want to see data that indicated an upward trend in the recruitment and retention of women over time.’’

The controversial gender quotas would be a blow to businesses in male-dominated industries such as construction, electricity and water supply, and manufacturing, where blokes make up at least 80 per cent of the workforce.

But companies with feminised workforces — such as cleaning, catering and social services — would also be forced to hire more men to win government work.

Women make up a massive 80 per cent of the workforce in healthcare and 70 per cent of workers in education.

Sex Discrimination Commissioner Kate Jenkins has told the federal government to take “disruptive action’’ and make private sector contractors hire more women.

The federal government awarded 70,338 contracts worth $57 billion to private companies in 2015-16, the latest data shows.

A quarter of the contracts went to small and medium-sized businesses. Government departments use contractors for supplies and services ranging from transport, healthcare and legal advice to building and maintenance, engineering work, information communications technology (ICT), cleaning and training.

Business groups blasted the social engineering proposal yesterday, warning that some companies could go broke if locked out of government work.

Australian Chamber of Commerce and Industry chief executive James Pearson said government agencies should seek to maximise value for taxpayers’ money, instead of dictating who contractors employ.

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“If gender balance requirements are imposed on government contractors, we may find that in some industries only a few contractors can bid, which means less competition and potentially a bad outcome for taxpayers,” he said. “It could make it harder for small businesses wanting government work, at a time when the government says it wants to help them.”

Mr Pearson said the government already required firms with more than 100 workers to report on “gender equity” measures through the Workplace Gender Equality Agency, which collects data but does not impose quotas.

Women already outnumber men in the public service, where 59 per cent of staff are female — although men make up 58 per cent of the senior executive service.